We are a group of portfolio managers, quantitative researchers, senior data / IT engineers, scholars and thinkers with varied backgrounds. Most of us hold advanced degrees in quantitative disciplines. We see abundant opportunities in the highly volatile yet rapidly growing crypto markets, and decide to set up a semi-decentralized crypto ecosystem intended for the benefit of the COMMunity and the public.
Founder: Wayne Yee, PhD
- Many years of quantitative alpha research experience in hedge funds. Familiar with asset management in stocks and cryptos, tokenomics and philosophy. Managed and researched market neutral equity portfolios and strategies in renowned quantitative hedge funds with good performance. Participated in the search for Higgs boson in Fermilab. The work and the ongoing research conducted at CERN’s Large Hadron Collider led to the discovery of the Higgs boson, the Nobel prize winner in physics 2013. B.S. in Physics, University of Science and Technology of China (USTC); Ph.D. in Physics, Stony Brook University.
Core team:
- John Gan, PhD: Dr. Gan obtained his Ph.D. from Harvard University with a solid background in applying machine learning algorithms and statistical inference to solve big data challenges. He then joined Harvard Business School as a researcher, focusing on asset pricing in emerging financial sectors including cryptos. At Harvard, John designed and implemented a course on financial technologies, linking AI and big data to financial services with real world cases. He has tutored over 1,000 students world wide, most of whom are industrial leaders with senior positions including C-level executives. See this interview to learn more about him and his role with COMM.
- Simon Cocking: Simon is Chief Editor of the Commonwealth Publisher, together with a few other influential crypto news medias with over 1.5 million constantly growing and unique monthly views. He is a top 3 ranked expert among People of Blockchain of ICO Bench, also a top 3 ranked advisor on ICO Holder. He is a business mentor and advisor working with over 200 successful companies to date, and has been named on many global Twitter influencer lists. Meanwhile, he is an accomplished public speaker at events including TEDx, Web Summit, and overseas in Monte Carlo, Pyeonchang, Amsterdam, Dubai, Delhi, Kiev, Singapore, Moscow, Tel Aviv, Madrid, Tbilisi, Riga, Porto, Dublin and Helsinki in the last 12 months. He has been based in Ireland for over 22 years and has cofounded or founded seven successful companies.
- Zhiyu Zhang, MS: Zhiyu is a core developer for USDC, and senior blockchain engineer in Circle Internet Financial. He oversees the wallet development and server structuring in Poloniex Exchange (acquired by Circle), and is familiar with the order matching system among trading pairs. A blockchain evangelist, he is also an open-source contributor of the Ethereum and Bitcoin communities. He received a master’s degree in Computer science.
- Jackey Yan, PhD: Dr. Yan is a cofounder of the COMM Project, a savvy investor and successful, serial entrepreneur with a strong technical background. He is a senior principal software engineer at Cadence Design Systems, focusing on scalable and efficient algorithm design, data structure, optimization, distributed system, and large-scale software development. Meanwhile, he invested in multiple startup businesses and operates his own with good cash flow. He is a Ph.D. in Computer Engineering. See this interview to learn more about him and his COMMents on the COMM project.
- Heming Zhen, PhD: Dr. Zhen is a quantitative researcher, and a software engineer at Verily - Google Life Sciences. He is a former program director in Data Engineering, Insight Data Science. Before that, he served as an assistant professor at Rush University Medical Center and Boston University Medical Center. He received his B.S. degree in Physics, University of Science and Technology of China, and Ph.D. degree in Medical Physics, University of Wisconsin at Madison.
- Winston Dai, Winston is currently a PhD student and research assistant with a full scholarship at MIT Department of Electrical Engineering and Computer Science. His research focuses on machine learning and its applications in industrial TB-level big data, including risk stratification, deep generative modeling and causal inference. He has published multiple papers and given talks at top AI conferences. At MIT, he has been a teaching assistant for several graduate level machine learning classes, and a research mentor for many undergraduate students.
- Jane Yang, PhD: Dr. Yang focuses on quantitative research on conventional and new data sets in the crypto domain, as well as trading in the crypto market. She participates in the full cycle of simulator construction, data analysis and portfolio construction. She has a B.S. degree in Biosciences, University of Science and Technology of China, and a Ph.D. degree in Cell Biology and Genetics, National University of Singapore.
- Veronica Lee, MS: Veronica is a versed visual designer and web developer. She has a multidisciplinary background in Information Systems & Information Management, HumanComputer Interaction (HCI) and Japanese. She has designed concept arts for a variety of industries including blockchain, filmmaking, medical care and logistics. She is enthusiastic in discovering the wonders of life and creating rich visual experience through professional design. Skilled in wireframing and prototyping, Veronica is also familiar with front-end development. She has a M.S. degree in Information Systems.
Advisors:
- Hamza Khan: Hamza Khan is a top 3 blockchain expert among People of Blockchain on ICO Bench, a senior ICO analyst with 5-year experience in the crypto world, and an expert in Ethereum and Stellar Blockchain. He worked with many ICOs and helped them reach successful positions in the market. He also helped many non-ICO projects to get their communities and become well-known among the Stellar platforms. Moreover, he is in contact with many renowned exchanges for listing the projects after their successful ICOs.
- Sean Brizendine: Sean has over 8 years of experience researching bitcoin and blockchain technology. He was rated 5+ POD (Proof of Developer) by CryptoAsian in 2014 and is a Certified IIB Council Blockchain Professional and Advisor, plus a lecturer of EC Council University in his Blockchain Cyber Talk Series. As an ICO Bench expert, he participated in over 40 blockchain related projects over the years, some of which were among the most successful token sales in history. In August 2018, former Bloomberg Anchor Jane King interviewed Sean live at the NASDAQ in Times Square, New York regarding blockchain applications and real world use cases.
- Yu Tian, PhD: Dr. Tian is a professor and doctoral supervisor at the University of Chinese Academy of Sciences (UCAS). He is currently a visiting scholar at the Center for Theoretical Physics, Massachusetts Institute of Technology. He has a B.S. degree in Physics, Zhejiang University, and a Ph.D. degree in Physics, Peking University. Before his tenure, he worked as a postdoctoral researcher in Institute of Theoretical Physics, Chinese Academy of Science.
- Krystelle Galano: Krystelle is a social networking expert and has more than 5 years of social media management experience such as in Facebook and Twitter marketing. She has been a public relations manager that plans and protects projects’ images. She has strong connections with top-tier crypto exchanges for direct listing, and renowned publishers like Corporate Investment Times Magazine for prompt press releases. She also has years of experience in crypto and blockchain areas as a marketing advisor for various ICOs. Her strategy brought them to the right tracks and gave them a successful head start.
- George Lai: George has more than five years experience working in the financial field, in particular quantitative research and derivative pricing. Currently he works in the investment banking division of TD Bank as a senior quant, and mainly focuses on the derivative products pricing. He formulates a large number of mathematical models for the front trading – 49 – desks in strategy construction, optimization, arbitraging and hedging. Prior to the current position, George was a quant researcher in a fintech company that develops applications of financial analytics with quantitative pricing solutions. He received his Ph.D. degree from the State University of New York at Stony Brook in biophysics. See this interview to learn more about him and his advisory assistance to COMM.
